


Forever and (Almost) Always

by liamthebastard



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, I promise, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-06
Updated: 2014-09-06
Packaged: 2018-02-16 07:59:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,410
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2261967
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/liamthebastard/pseuds/liamthebastard
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em>So you'll be mine, forever and almost always. And I'll be fine, just love me when you can. And I'll wait patiently, I'll wake up every day just hoping that you'll still care.</em>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

So maybe life wasn’t exactly what Stiles had wanted it to be. Maybe being with Derek wasn’t everything Stiles had hoped. Maybe what he’d thought was a fairytale romance in high school… wasn’t.  But it was awful close. And just short of perfect is better than nothing, right? Certainly better than being without Derek. He’d take his affection when he could, however Derek could give it, and be happy with it. . Almost always was better than never, so Stiles was going to stick it out until Derek walked away.

And maybe part of him whispered that he deserved better. When Derek would leave for days at a time and come back looking exhausted, or when he’d hold something back, maybe that voice would whisper that something wasn’t right between them.

Those days, they would fight. Stiles would scream and shout at Derek until Derek swore to be around more, to be more open with Stiles. And they’d go to bed, and Derek would hold him the whole night, and he’d feel normal for a night. He’d wake up the next morning full of hope that this time would be different. And sometimes it was, for a few weeks. Until Derek disappeared again.

It was always hard to forgive him when he came back. Stiles always told himself he was done giving out second chances. But all Derek really had to do was look at Stiles like he did, like Stiles had hung the moon and stars and Derek was marvelling at the beauty of a universe he couldn’t comprehend, and Stiles melted.

Because Derek was his. Nobody else’s, just his. Even if it was only for now, just until Derek got tired of it. It was worth it, for the way Derek looked at him. Maybe Derek never actually said how he felt about Stiles, but surely actions spoke louder than words. The tender touches, the soft smiles, they couldn’t mean nothing. It was worth sticking around for.

Right?

 

o0o

  
  


But this time was different. Different from the other times Derek had run off and returned days later, because this time Stiles was done, well and truly. Derek was never gone more than four days doing whatever the hell he did when he vanished, but it’d been a week and there was no sign of him. Stiles had called, texted, tweeted, emailed, facebooked, and even myspaced Derek, all to no avail. Absolute radio silence. He stayed up late into the night, using the key Derek gave him to sit in the living room of Derek’s loft, hoping Derek would come in just so Stiles could end it.

It wasn’t right, what Derek was doing to him. Stringing him along, disappearing for days and cheating on him for all Stiles knew, and all the while, expecting Stiles to just sit around and love him anyway. Well no more. He was done. It wasn’t fair to just love Stiles sometimes, Stiles was worth more than that.

On the eighth night of Derek’s disappearance, Stiles gave up his watch. He’d brought over all the things Derek had left at his apartment, and set about gathering up his things from the loft. There was more than he expected, but soon he was done and his stuff was loaded carefully into the Jeep. He headed back up to the loft to leave the key and note. The key was placed in the empty keybowl by the door, and the letter was propped up beside it, Derek’s name clearly legible on the outside of the envelope.

Stiles left the loft without looking back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry. Happy ending, pinky promise?


	2. Chapter 2

Derek dragged his body up the stairs to his loft. He could feel the nasty bruises and couple of broken bones healing as he moved, and they’d probably still look pretty nasty when he got into the loft, but if his hearing was working correctly, Stiles wasn’t even there, so he didn’t need to worry about killing time until he healed and could face him unquestioned. 

A part of him winced at the thought of Stiles’s inevitable disappointment, but it was better this way. No sane human would be with a werewolf, hell, if Derek even mentioned the word, Stiles would think he was crazy. Which would lead to Derek scrambling to prove it, which would lead to Stiles being afraid of him.

And Derek couldn’t take that. Better Stiles’s disappointment than his fear. Better Stiles leave him out of anger than be afraid of him. 

He reached for the door, raising an eyebrow when it turned out to be unlocked. Stiles was always forgetting to lock it, he must’ve come by sometime during the day, which meant the loft would still smell pleasantly like him. Derek’s wolf liked that, the smell of his mate strong around him when he was injured. But when the door opened, the loft smelled… off. Instead of anxious Stiles, or angry Stiles, or even upset Stiles, all of which were normal scents for Derek to come home to, all he could smell was… resignation, at least two days old, a scent so heavy and syrupy in its blandness that it drowned out any other aspect of Stiles’s scent.

Without thinking he reached to drop his keys in the bowl, and startled when his fingers brushed paper, putting his keys back in his pocket since the bowl was apparently full. He turned, dread growing in his stomach, and it only got worse when he spotted Stiles’s key in the bowl, next to a letter with his name on it. With shaking fingers, Derek picked the letter up, scenting the pain and resignation imprinted on the paper. He didn’t even bother to go to a chair, he just sat down and tore open the envelope, careful to leave Stiles’s weirdly neat handwriting intact. 

Part of him already knew what the letter was going to say, but he was helpless to spare himself the pain of it.

He read: _I’m sorry to do it this way, but I have tried every other means of contact short of carrier pigeon to reach you, and in order for carrier pigeons to work, I’d have to actually know where you are. Which I don’t anymore, ever. Even when you’re with me, your head’s somewhere else. We keep circling around, nothing ever changes. You promise things will get better, that you’ll be more honest, but I know you’re lying to me. And it kills me every time I have to watch you lie about where you’ve been. It isn’t fair to me. I can’t be with someone who can’t be honest with me. I deserve someone who is actually present in my life. And you probably deserve a better end than a letter. But this is where we are, this is what has happened to us. If I’d known that day freshman year just how bad we’d mess this thing up, I never would have asked you to help me study. I would’ve bothered someone else, and maybe you and I would be okay now. Separate, but at least I wouldn’t be like I am now. I’m sorry._

Stiles didn’t sign it. He didn’t sign it, and not once did he say Derek’s name. That little observation was enough to twist the knife Stiles’s words had shoved into Derek’s gut. God, he’d fucked up so badly, hadn’t he? He’d thought he could do it all - take over as Alpha for Laura, safeguard the pack territory, and protect Stiles from the insanity that was his life - but he couldn’t, and now he’d gone and lost the most important thing in his world. And it was so broken, so, so broken, he could tell just from Stiles’s writing. How the hell was he supposed to fix something that broken?

He let the despair swallow him for a few moments, but with Stiles’s scent around him, his wolf wouldn’t settle. Not until he saw his mate safe. And… even if it was broken beyond repair, he had to try. 

Once the decision was made, he didn’t even bother with the Camaro. His wolf needed to run, despite the ache of fresh-healed wounds, and so he ran across town, sweating and breathing heavy when he finally ended up outside Stiles’s apartment. His hair was a mess, and his face almost certainly still held greenish bruises from his fight with a neighbouring pack, but he didn’t care. He could hear Stiles’s heartbeat on the other side of the door, and so he started to knock. 

Stiles’s heart rate picked up a bit, and Derek heard him come to peek through the peephole to see who was at the door. But the knob never turned, and Stiles never spoke. So Derek knocked again. 

“Stiles. Please, please, please let me in. God, Stiles, I’m sorry, please open the door,” Derek pleaded, but all he heard was Stiles’s retreating footsteps and a whump as he sat down on what was most likely the futon. Derek whimpered a little, and rested his body against the door. He gave Stiles a little more time to change his mind, but when he heard Stiles’s computer speakers start up, he reached for the spare key in his pocket. 

He unlocked the door slowly, giving Stiles plenty of notice that he was coming in before he opened the door and stepped inside. Before he could even speak, Stiles was shouting. 

“Get out! Get the fuck out of here, and leave that key in the door. I am done with you, do you hear me? Done!” Stiles shouted, standing up from the couch and approaching Derek angrily. “I won’t do this shit with you anymore, I can’t do it anymore!”

He’d always been so physical with his emotions, both his anger and his love, and Derek was so bad with words and didn’t know any other way to communicate what he was feeling, so he ran with his instincts and leaned in to kiss his mate.

But Stiles was furious, and pushed him off before Derek could properly kiss him and show how sorry he was. “I said _I’m fucking done_ what part of that wasn’t clear? I want you gone, Hale, and I don’t want to see you again!”

“Stiles, _please_ god just listen to me,” Derek said, but Stiles steamrolled him.

“Ten days, Hale. You were gone _ten days_ without a word to me before or during. If the next words out of your mouth aren’t exactly where you were and why, I don’t care to hear them, and even then it’s a longshot that I’ll listen,” Stiles fumed, shoving Derek’s shoulder away when Derek instinctually leaned closer. 

So Derek started talking. “I’m sorry, Stiles, god, I’m so sorry. I can’t- I can’t be without you, Stiles, you’ve gotta know that. I hate that I’ve done this to you, God, it hurts to even _think_ about being without my mate-”

Stiles had gone stiff, eyes wide and face frozen. Derek paused. “Say that again. Just the last part.”

It took Derek exactly two seconds to pinpoint his mistake, but it was too late now. He had to explain, and Stiles was going to hate him or fear him, and it was going to be the worst thing to happen to Derek since his parents’ death years prior. 

“It hurts to even think about being without my mate,” Derek repeated, slow and miserable. 

Stiles took a deep breath. “What the hell does that mean,” he said, his voice deadly quiet and furious in a way Derek had never heard before. 

Derek sighed. “I’m not human, Stiles. I’m- a werewolf, like my sisters and my mother. Mom was our Alpha, but when she died, Laura took over. But Laura joined Alex’s pack when she married her, remember? We went to the wedding together, and you got entirely too drunk on that stupid fizzy wine,” Derek deviated for a moment, but a sharp look from Stiles got him back on track. At least Stiles hadn’t called him crazy yet. “So I had to step up. And sometimes, our pack gets threatened, especially since I’m a new Alpha. I had to protect my pack and my territory, but that meant leaving you behind. To keep you safe, because you’re my mate and I love you.” Derek finished and stared down at his boots, refusing to look at Stiles’s face.

“Do you think I’m stupid?” Stiles finally asked. Derek shook his head frantically, opening his mouth to argue. “Just own up to whatever you’ve been doing, don’t make shit up and think I’ll buy it,” Stiles bit out. 

“I can prove it!” Derek said brashly. If he was going to hell for hurting Stiles, he may as well truly deserve it. Stiles nodded for Derek to go ahead and try, but his face made it clear he doubted any proof would come. Derek just stepped to the side to let Stiles have free access to the door, then let his face fall into his beta form. 

His eyes flashed red and his sideburns grew. Claws extended where nails once grew, and fangs dropped in his mouth. And he looked down and waited for Stiles to scream or run or both. 

Instead, moments later he felt Stiles’s arms get thrown around his shoulders. Stiles leaned against him so quickly that they both dropped to their knees, with Stiles’s face buried in Derek’s shoulder. It took Derek a few minutes to realize that Stiles was crying, but the moment he did he shifted back to his human form to hold Stiles without his claws, knowing how badly Stiles wanted to be held when he cried like that. 

Stiles’s sobs became more coherent after a few minutes. “I… thought you didn’t… love me…” Stiles sobbed out.

That gutted him, it really did. As if there was a way for Derek to not love this man. It made tears well up in his own eyes, the idea that Stiles had been hurting so badly for so long and Derek hadn’t seen it.

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry. I love you, Stiles, so much,” Derek muttered, repeating it over and over as they knelt and cried together. 

After a time, Stiles tilted up his tear-damp face and gently kissed Derek, who almost shattered from the tenderness. They weren’t okay, but they had the chance to be someday.

Maybe love wasn’t enough for them to make it, but Derek was going to do his best to try.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeaaaahhhh. Inspired by the song 'Forever and Almost Always' by Kate Voegele. Thanks to Brenna for listening to me word vomit the concept for this.


End file.
